The signing must now be just a formality. Otherwise, the Devils should not have bothered bringing in Petr Sykora because he played as well as anyone on the team.

“I don’t know what else he could do in camp,” coach Pete DeBoer said, seemingly endorsing Sykora’s roster bid. “If you could script up a camp for a guy walking on. . . . However it shakes out, I don’t think he can have any regrets about how he [played].”

Sykora cemented his case for a contract in last night’s 2-1 triumph over the Flyers in Newark by scoring on a breakaway, and finished preseason sharing the team lead with two goals.

If that total sounds meager, the Devils managed just 11 goals in six games, including an overtime winner, picking up right where they left off last season as the lowest-scoring team in the NHL. Sykora, 34, has shown why he is a 10-time 20-goal scorer — the Devils only had two players top 15 last season.

“I proved to myself that with the right players, I can still play in this league — I really believe it,” said Sykora, who shared the team’s point lead with three in four auditions. “I can still score in this league.”

Salary shouldn’t be an issue, and Sykora stands to be a top-six forward.

“A great freebie, a guy who can score goals like that,” Zach Parise said.

Now the hopefuls wait until tomorrow, having won their final two for a 3-3 preseason. Still, they had one less point than their 2-1-3 exhibition record last year, which preceded the 9-22-3 season-opening fiasco that cost John MacLean the coaching job.

*

Martin Brodeur won his first game of the preseason, and said that a bruise he absorbed when hit by a shot on the left shoulder should be fine when the team resumes practice tomorrow. . . . Islanders first-rounder Ryan Strome, taken fifth overall in June, one slot behind New Jersey’s Adam Larsson, escaped further discipline for boarding Stephen Gionta with 3:14 left Friday. Strome was ejected with a major penalty, but video evidence was too scanty on the non-televised game. . . . Matt Taormina remains idle with an upper-body injury. Bryce Salvador rested his lower-body soreness. . . . The Devils assigned goalie Jeff Frazee and forwards Matt Anderson, Gionta, Chad Wiseman and Steve Zalewski to AHL Albany. . . . The Devils host the Flyers in their season opener Saturday. Philly watches the Bruins hoist their Stanley Cup banner Thursday.